TEN days before a mom-of-four vanished into thin air, she texted her family that she was going to leave her husband of more than 15 years following a spate of alleged domestic violence.
Nikki Cheng Saelee-McCain has not been seen or heard from since late in the evening of May 17.
The 39-year-old was last sighted visiting one of her husband's relatives in a hospital in Redding, California, about 160 miles from Sacramento.
Nikki texted her sister, Chloe Saelee, informing her she was leaving the hospital to drive her mother-in-law's car back to her in-laws' house and that a friend of her husband would follow in a car to drop her home afterward.
Chloe continued to text Nikki that night and into the early hours of May 18 but never received another response.
Nikki was reported missing on May 21 to the Shasta County Sheriff's Office.
That report was filed by Chloe after she contacted Nikki's husband, Tyler McCain, to inquire if he knew where Nikki was.
When Tyler responded that he hadn't heard from her for a few days either, the police were immediately called.
Nikki's Chevrolet Avalanche was found abandoned on May 25 in a remote location in Tehama County.
No further trace of Nikki has been yielded since.
As the days and weeks continue to anxiously tick by without answers, Chloe and another of Nikki's sisters, Kaye Ford, told The U.S. Sun they are increasingly resigned to the idea that something terrible has happened to their beloved sibling.
Fueling their concern is a text Nikki sent to Chloe just 10 days before her disappearance, in which she stated her intention to divorce Tyler and start her life anew.
"She was really excited. She was looking at furniture for a new place and she was ready to leave Tyler and divorce him for good," said Chloe.
"She had plans to start over, to get her kids back, and she was ready and looking forward to it."
According to Chloe and Kaye, Nikki and Tyler's relationship began falling apart when the pandemic struck in 2020 and, in the years that followed, allegedly became increasingly violent.
In December last year, Tyler was arrested and charged with four felony counts of domestic violence after Nikki accused him of tying her up and viciously beating her over three horrifying hours inside their home.
Tyler was due to appear in court to face those charges two weeks after Nikki vanished. In the meantime, the case has been dropped in the wake of her disappearance.
Chloe said her sister was excited about her future and starting her life over in the days before she disappeared, pointing to her messages as evidence Nikki didn't vanish of her own volition.
"She was ready to leave Tyler and divorce him for good," said Chloe, recounting texts she received from Nikki on May 7.
"Nikki told me she realized he was very selfish, that everything was just about him, and the way he treated her wasn't how a husband should be treating their wife.
"She was really confident and determined – and she was ready to take those next steps, finally."
Ten days later, Nikki would be seen alive for the last time.
Chloe and Kaye are unclear on many of the details of her last known movements, which are not helped by Tyler and his relatives' apparently conflicting accounts.
All they know is that their sister went to the hospital with Tyler's family concerning a medical emergency involving his brother.
Family members all reportedly piled into different cars, with various people shuffling vehicles around, driving people back and forth from the hospital, and dropping cars off.
Exactly where Nikki was, who she was with, and what vehicle she was in, is unclear.
"Later that night she texted Chloe and let her know that she was on her way to drop her mother-in-law’s vehicle off back at her house and that one of Tyler's friends would be following her to then bring her back home," said Kaye.
"We don't know who that person was or if that even happened.
"From that point, the story has changed a little bit. We've been told she took an Uber back from her mother-in-law's house but we don't know if that's true.
"We have no evidence of her leaving that home."
Nikki's mother-in-law lives close to the Redding Rancheria, a Native American reservation.
In a statement, the Rancheria says they are deeply saddened that Nikki has been missing for so long, adding that she's "close and dear to many in our Tribal community and we wish for her safe return home."
Reservation officials have been working closely with law enforcement and the non-profit NorCal Alliance For The Missing, offering a $30,000 reward for information that leads to her discovery and displaying a large billboard along the nearby interstate.
I was just in shock because I couldn't believe how many injuries she had and how she could've survived.
Chloe Saelee
Founder of NorCal Alliance, Trudy Nickens, told The U.S. Sun the local community is showing up in force for Nikki's family.
"Our community is very concerned," said Nickens. "Once again, we have this beautiful young woman who is missing without answers.
"It's frustrating the sheriff's office hasn't shared much information, but they're still working the case.
"Everybody is just really worried and trying to rally around Nikki's family to help keep the story alive, keep conducting searches, and not allowing the case to go cold."
Nikki's sisters told The U.S. Sun they've been living in fear for her life for some time following alleged domestic violence issues between her and Tyler.
Requests for comment with Tyler McCain's attorney have so far gone unanswered.
The Shasta County Sheriff's Office has refused to confirm whether or not Tyler McCain is being investigated as a suspect in Nikki's disappearance.
However, Chloe and Kaye said their fears were realized in December last year when Nikki checked into a hospital after suffering a litany of vicious injuries she accused Tyler of inflicting.
Chloe accompanied Nikki to the hospital and claimed she was so severely beaten she didn't even recognize her sister.
"I was very taken aback and I was terrified," said Chloe. "She looked like a completely different person and I was just in shock because I couldn't believe how many injuries she had and how she could've survived.
"It looked absolutely horrible."
Shasta County Sheriff's records show that officers were summoned to Mercy Hospital on December 1 and encountered Nikki after she'd been treated at the ER.
The responding officer reported noticing facial trauma to both of Nikki's eyes, forehead, and face.
"Both of her eyes were blackened severely, both were swollen in what appeared to be the result of a physical assault," reads the report.
"I asked [the victim] who did this to her. She stated it was her husband, Tyler McClain [sic]."
In her recounted version of events, Nikki told the officer she'd returned home the night before around 8:15 pm to find that Tyler wasn't home, state the documents.
Nikki went into the bedroom to comb her hair. Approximately 15 minutes later, Tyler returned home in a "strange mood and for some reason went and locked the back door of the house."
"Tyler seemed extremely agitated and was not making any sense," reads the report.
"When he contacted her in the bedroom area, she said he immediately jumped on her, held her down on the ground and dragged her around, yelled at her and asked her, 'What's going on? What are you doing?'"
Nikki told the officer Tyler had a "glazed, scary look in his eyes" and suggested it appeared as though he was having some sort of "mental episode."
While Nikki tried unsuccessfully to calm him down, Tyler allegedly tormented her, pinned her to the ground, and "repeatedly" struck her in the face and started pulling her hair.
"[Nikki] stated this behavior by Tyler continued for approximately three hours during which time he bound her ankles and wrists together with white tape," reads the report.
"He also placed a piece of tape over her mouth, so she could not speak properly [...] During this time, [Nikki] stated Tyler turned her over onto her stomach and straddled her from behind, pulled on her hair, and forcefully pulled her head back, saying he was going to kill her."
Nikki told police she genuinely believed she was going to die and that Tyler "intended to kill her," the report states.
She claimed Tyler tried to wrap an unknown item around her neck to choke her but was apparently unsuccessful.
After three hours, Nikki told police she was able to wriggle free of her restraints while Tyler was in another room, grab her car keys, and flee the home.
She checked into the hospital the following day.
Nikki told the police she was unsure of Tyler's "illegal drug use" but said she believed he used methamphetamine periodically, which may explain his glazed and irritable state, according to the records.
Tyler, meanwhile, told police there hadn't been any disturbance between him and Nikki and instead theorized she must've sustained the injuries in a fight with someone else, possibly a woman.
According to the report, Tyler also offered the police "inconsistent" statements, first claiming he believed Nikki was having an affair with another woman and later stating they "got along great, and have been together as a happy couple" for years.
Tyler was arrested and charged with four felony charges of domestic violence.
He pleaded not guilty to the charges, which the local DA's office has since dropped.
The decision caused outrage locally, prompting county DA Stephanie Bridgett to release a statement to quell the mounting controversy.
Bridgett said her office has made every possible attempt to find a legal way to continue pursuing the charges but said it's impossible to do so given Tyler's constitutional right to face his accuser in court.
“In the United States everyone has a constitutional right to confront the witnesses against them,” Bridgett said.
“That means the accuser, the victim, must be present in trial to confront them and we haven’t been able to locate her.”
Moving the case forward now without Nikki's testimony would jeopardize the court’s ability ever to hold McCain accountable for domestic violence even if he admitted it later, Bridgett said.
That's because of double jeopardy, a legal term that essentially forbids retrying an individual for the same crime twice.
Bridgett further emphasized that felony domestic violence has a three-year statute of limitations, meaning even though the case has been dismissed for now, it can be refiled anytime within the next two-and-a-half years if and when new evidence comes to light.
“And that is what we want to be able to do,” Bridgett said.
“We want to pursue, preserve that ability to hold him liable for that case.”
Police were called to Nikki and Tyler's home numerous times since 2020, resulting in their four children being removed from their care by the state in 2022, Chloe and Kaye said.
Chloe and Kaye say they would regularly plead with Nikki to leave Tyler and move out of the home, which she'd occasionally agreed to do for days before eventually returning.
However, since the December 2023 incident, the sisters say Nikki realized that her and Tyler's relationship was unlikely to improve, and she was determined to leave him and regain full custody of her children.
Tyler's message first sounded alarm bells in Chloe and Kaye's minds, prompting them to call the police on May 21.
During previous incidents and flare-ups in the couple's relationship – whereby Nikki would leave and stay with a family member or friend for a few days at a time – the two women say Tyler would ask them to, "Tell her I love her. Tell her I'm sorry."
Kaye said, "He would usually say something to that effect and be apologetic because he wanted her to come back.
"But this time, he said, 'I think she's missing. I don't know I think she's missing.'
"So his response was different than normal, and that was definitely a factor for us in starting to worry."
Chloe said she has reluctantly – and heartbreakingly – accepted the reality that finding her sister alive after three months missing is incredibly unlikely.
However, she and Kaye believe someone knows what happened to her and urged them to come forward to share what they know.
"I feel like Nikki may not be here anymore," confessed Chloe.
"She wouldn't just walk off and leave. She was so excited for a fresh start and she was taking all these steps and planning for her and her kids' futures."
Chloe added, "Nikki is such a forgiving person and a loyal person, and for anyone that hurt her in some way or kind, I just want them to remember Nikki's kindness [...] and maybe they can have a change of heart and please just come forward.
"Nikki didn't deserve this. And while it may be too late to turn back time, it's not too late to do the right thing.
"Do it for her children. Do it for her family [...] her children deserve to know the truth and her children deserve to see whoever did this to her is behind bars and won't be able to hurt them or anyone else."
The two sisters say they're determined to get answers and will not stop until justice is achieved in Nikki's name.
Appealing directly to her missing sister, Chloe said, "I want her to know I'm going to keep fighting for her, and I know there will be justice served for her.
"I want her to know I love her and I miss her, and I want to make sure that nobody else will ever have to do this."
If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or chat at thehotline.org.
